Moscow called the grounds for which the United States had decided on new sanctions against the Russian Federation wrong, saying that the U.S. government agencies’ actions were zombie-like.

"With regard to the decision of the U.S. Treasury announced Dec. 22, I consider it necessary to declare: first of all, the very basis which such decisions are taken on, is wrong and has nothing to do with the reality that has developed in recent years in Crimea and southeast Ukraine," Ryabkov said.

"The U.S. government agencies act like zombies bursting through an open door. They have to concern about influencing the authorities in Kyiv, but repeating it is senseless. It is clear that it's useless saying it to those who act like zombies," he said.

It became known on Tuesday that the U.S. has significantly expanded the list of Russian individuals and legal entities subjected to Ukraine-related sanctions. The companies and banks actively operating in the occupied Crimea have been entered in the "black list" (specially designated nationals and blocked persons list) as well as companies related to the entities and persons of the current list including Genbank, Krayinvestbank, Inresbank, Mosoblbank, Tekhnopromexport, Volgogradneftemash, and others. The subsidiaries of Sberbank, VTB, Rostec, VTB 24, Sberbank Europe AG, and Yandex-Money have been put on the list of entities subjected to the sectoral sanctions (which are considerably milder).